Jeannot l'intrepide

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Posted: Sun Oct 02, 2011 7:01 pm

Can anybody shed light on this animation that I have just watched on Canal+ France. It was made in 1950 and is titled "Jeannot l'intrepide"

Strikes me as being very political and may relate to what was happening in France with the government at the time.

The synopsis reads:

Quote:

Realise par jean image en 1950. Film d'animation francaise. Des enfants se rendent en foret pour empecher un ogre de manger leurs amis. L'un d'entre eux, reduit a la talle d'un insecte, vit d'etranges aventures

Google translate wrote:

Directed by Jean picture in 1950. French animated film. Children go into the forest to prevent an ogre to eat their friends. One of them, reduced to the clump of an insect, lives of strange adventures

From five minutes of research, it seems that I have only seen a small amount of this animation which is approximately the last ten minutes. You can see it from the beginning here and follow the links beyond.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pInxQb2Uv3E&feature=related

The bit I saw is here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BHfx2VHt4P8&feature=related

Posted: Sun Oct 02, 2011 8:00 pm

Despite having a degree in French literature, and having studied French culture, this particular cartoon is a new one on me.

Given the 1950 date and the theme of that last part of the cartoon, I can only assume that it was meant as a strong allusion to then-recent Nazi occupation and ultimate liberation of France. A bit of patriotic fervor designed for children too young to understand the details of what happened just before they were born.

The Google translation says "clump of an insect" because of a typo in French. The word "talle" should be "taille," which means "the size of an insect".

It's hard for us today to realize the intensity of the emotions that Europeans felt after WWII, and how long that bitterness lasted. When I lived in France in 1968, even though it had been 23 years since the war ended, memories and prejudices remained very strong. The Métro still had reserved seats for "mutilés de guerre" -- veterans wounded in the war. There were a lot of them around.

In 1978 I was denied a hotel room in eastern France because I was driving a rental car I had picked up in Frankfurt, and which consequently had German license plates. When it dawned on me what was happening, I explained to the proprietor that I was American and that the car was a rental. Suddenly there was room at the inn........ I dumped the car and replaced it with a new rental with French plates because at a local restaurant that evening I was warned about potential vandalism if I drove that car in the area. Shocked

Even as recently as 1999 when I traveled through Normandy with my wife and daughter I couldn't believe the hostility with which many people spoke about German tourists when I talked with them privately. Then I realized that for the middle-aged shopkeepers and restaurateurs I was talking with, the war and its aftermath was still well within their memory. They were in a region that suffered heavily for years.

Edit to add: the filmmaker's name was Jean Image; Google translated his last name as "picture." But Jean Image was not his real name; he obviously chose "Image" as a name since it fit his work in film. His real name was Emeric Hajdu.

Posted: Sun Oct 02, 2011 8:45 pm

Thanks Juan.

I'm surprised that both you and I have seen this for the first time.

I had a feeling that the Nazi thing was there and that it may be lost with the kids that it was aimed at.
I did also wonder about a race thing as a lot of cartoons around the time depicted African's as black with big white eyes.

I had a vision of the adults of the time thinking that it would help to get the message across but being so soon after the war, the adults would see the point but the children would actually turn their backs. They must have had so much political propaganda in their faces at the time. Confused

Posted: Mon Oct 03, 2011 11:09 pm

Quote:

size of an insect

Also the last phrase should be "lives [i.e. experiences] strange adventures". "d'" here is a partitive article, not a preposition.